Tag Archives: the moon’s accomplice
Some Maunderings About Rewriting a Novel
If you’re friend or family, you may know something about it, or even have read one of the many, many earlier drafts.
And I’m really happy with it, but holy cow, is it hard to rewrite a novel. Because you’ve got to manage it all in your head while working with smaller parts of it.
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Realization About Shadow Twins
Weird little things happen like this when you’re working on something big. It’s like a lens clicks into place and you perceive a section better. And that perception spreads out, affects the view you have of the overall piece, the unruly profusion of plot lines, each with its flowers of action scenes and climatic moments, that will become the lavish bouquet of the book’s world. Continue reading
What Do You Think Of This Book Synopsis?
One of the things I’ve been doing is reading other big sprawling fantasy novels: the Robert Jordan/Brandon Sanderson Wheel of Time series, George R. R. Martin’s Game of Thrones, Pat Rothfuss’s The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man’s Fear, David Edding’s Belgariad and Robin Hobb’s work. I’m trying to figure out what makes for a successful series of fantasy books. What other series would you suggest looking at? Continue reading
Revising Through A Single Lens
I’ve been reading Donald Maass’s excellent, excellent book Writing the Breakout Novel (which is, unfortunately, not available on the Kindle so I actually had to do the archaic order and wait for a hardcopy thing) and it’s at a perfect time for me since I’m beginning the second pass at the current project. As I’ve read, I’ve collected ideas to apply to rewrite. I’m making the heroine’s past considerably more complex, shoving the hero a bit more ruthlessly out of his depth, making some bad guys more ambiguous morally, killing my very favorite character, letting a villainess be much, much bitchier (and funnier), and raising the stakes repeatedly. Continue reading





